If the rules say that you can't spray CT on food crops for 120 days before harvest, then they are talking about foliar feed. They are worried about I. coli which forms in anaerobic situations in CT where there is too much food for the organisms (molasses) and too little aeration getting on food that is going to market.
The participants in the CT list/serve are talking about their CT makers in terms of their ability to clean them well and quickly and in terms of getting not only bacteria, but a balance of bacteria and fungi. There's so much to understand. I would say that the NOP standards apply only to "Certified" organic growers. But certified organic is supposed to be the highest standard in the U.S. If they are so worded that they exclude the use of CT, then really they aren't useful for organic farmers because 24-hour CT as conceptualized by Elaine at Soil Food Web, Inc. makes organic much better. This is why Elaine's lectures around the world are so important. A lot of organic growers don't really know anything about what is actually going on in making compost--only that raw manure is prohibited. They have the rule without the understanding, and could easily have anaerobic conditions in their compost pile to start with. Elaine is writing a guide for understanding compost making. That ought to help matters. I surely do hope she can reach mainstream organic growers. If people do listen and understand instead of just following rules, then there shouldn't be any trouble. There also must be a difference between a cow pie you pick up in a BD pasture and the stuff that comes out of the kind of confined conditions that exist in feed lots. This does not help matters. I found Will Brinton's analysis of 500 to have limitations. His analysis of 500 doesn't tell me why it enlivens the soil. It only says that 500 is not raw manure. But how do BD compost and 500 work together? Has anyone ever been able to analyze the process or is it too esoteric? Allan Balliett wrote: > If you're monitoring SANET or Elaine Inghams compost tea discussion > group, you already know that the USDA organic rules group has been > advised to restrict the use of compost teas on food crops. This > applies particularly to teas that use added sugars (mollasses, for > example). Already, however, it appears that the rule may be > generalized to 'ban' all cow manure based teas. The chances of this > impacting BD 500 and BC is very high. Of course, this only applies to > people who are interested in receiving USDA organic certification, > but the possibility of truly negative publicity is very high. I don't > have all the details on these events, and what I've said above may be > misleading. > > What I have to say most importantly is that we need to gather all the > information we can on this move by the USDA organic group and discuss > it among ourselves so we are prepared to speak out on it and more > importantly, to talk intelligently to our customers about the > difference between biodynamically grown foods and USDA organics. > > -Allan
